I'm Thirsty - Drown Me
by Ambrosia29
Summary: Another contribution for Bethyl Smut Week. Beth returns and after a week of waiting, Daryl chances upon stolen moments with her. "She knew him. Saw deeper than few others could dream. She reached him in the darkness. He paused, framed her face with a hard hand and gently stroking thumb, took a moment to look into her eyes again. Blue. Deep that had nothing to do with their color."


**A/N: This just came to me. It's rough. No pun intended. Little editing. And nearly 5am. Enjoy (we have to stop meeting like this). Bethyl Smut Week (been inspired apparently).**

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He swallowed her down like she was rain and he, a parched desert. And he was. Where they touched, drought and flood, he felt the sizzle of her into his flesh and it only spurned him onward, craving her, needing her, hands and arms wrapping tighter. He forced himself to slow, taste her with more care lest the force of it - the passion gripping him like iron - frighten her.

But she could take it. She had faced him before - broke him when nothing else could - and made him face himself. He'd named her 'strong' and so she was. Far more than he himself had ever dreamed.

And dream he did. It had ached in his chest, burned his eyes with tears, left him hollow, bereft of life for weeks. Weeks turning cold, closed off, numb. He dreamed of her when nothing else could balm the pain. Which only made everything worse.

He dreamed of The End, when fate took her from him, only barely back again. He met her tongue with his as he forced away the briefest touch that was then their only reunion.

Tangled hands in her hair and pushed her back til they met resistance. Was it a wall? Did he care? Did she?

Her hands slid upward and found skin, melting away clothes as if on contact. He hissed at the sensation of it, sure her hands were fire melting flesh in their wake. He growled, tugged her against him, laid his mouth over her throat in one caress or several, moaning with frustration at his inability to drown in her.

Keening. High, sharp, aching. He knew aching. Trembled with it. Tortured with it. He lifted her and she curled into his hands, his body, wrapping around him like it was the hundredth. She knew him. Saw deeper than few others could dream.

She reached him in the darkness.

He paused, framed her face with a hard hand and gently stroking thumb, took a moment to look into her eyes again. Blue. Deep that had nothing to do with their color and everything that broke him open. His wordless reply was a terribly-beautiful combination of wonder and anguish. Her loving hands reached to brush tender tears away and he could do nothing less than fall into her once again.

It was insistent, implacable fate that hurdled him on. Clothes vanished - fell, torn, ripped away - and he held her as much with his eyes as his hands, his arms and his body. Her body slick against his, sinking down. Drawing him in and in and God, if she hadn't dug nails into his arms and drove herself harder with anguished longing he'd not have found the strength to do it.

He followed her lead, took her direction and tracked her as deep as she allowed him.

In their eyes were questions, answers and whisper-growled declarations. He shoved himself into her, her into the surface behind her and she took his mouth with her teeth.

Bite. Hard. Sweetest of coppery tastes, its scent in his nose, his lips and tongue. Who'd broken skin didn't matter. She didn't stop.

Theirs was a desperation. Years apart, years he tried to bury her in his heart when she flew aloft in the knowledge that he was a survivor. For him, hope had died. For her, the certainty of him had kept her moving.

Nails dug their tips into his skin, shoulders a bright sting he took as he took her body, her lips and tongue and teeth because it was her, all of it was in her, for her, because of her.

Never again would this go unanswered between them. He'd waited. Been patient. All of them had lost her that day and while he'd lost something back there he knew the pull of blood. Biding his time.

And she grew impatient with hers.

She was alone. Family gone, where didn't matter. She'd been alone. He watched it happen, coming from beyond the wall and veering for the door as he passed her kin on the street without a word.

He cared. He did. But he was starving, dying of thirst.

She was food, drink and breath.

The door was unlocked. Foolish. It swung open and the remark died unspoken, as so many things between them had. Things. Between them. Table. Couch. Rug.

Were as nothing when she wordlessly rushed to meet him. They crashed together, dropping crossbow and bowl uncaring to the floor and locked themslves together.

He dove into her again and immersed himself in what was a frantic kind of peace, of bliss, within her. Her scent, her blood thick in his nostrils. Her skin and muscle and bone - so delicate, so fragile this steel of hers - beneath his hands and oh, so soft. He ground himself into her, eyes nearly rolling back at the look in her eyes, the tears welling there.

He took a breath and passed that ragged edge only to follow hers as they fell - flung - headlong into a pleasure which left them blind and breathing.

Slowly, the white of the world dimmed. Breathing was no longer all they knew. Hands. Arms. Legs. Embrace. She nuzzled his nose and he tried a grin. He gripped her shoulders and held her tight to him, brushing loose curls from her eyes, exposing the pale scars to his touch.

Her breath caught and held, loosed so sweetly when he leaned down to brush them with his lips. He was a man of few words. None, when the situation called for it. Hands wandered again, palming, stroking...stoking.

And so they were again. She accepted it, reveled in it after initial surprise. His smile softened his angular features and it was slower, gentler. At first.

He was still thirsty and hadn't quite drowned.


End file.
